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McDowell’s Views

In lecture six of Mind and World, (amongst other things) Mc Dowell attempts to draw a distinction between rational animals (i.e. humans) and non-rational animals. He does this by making use of Gadamer’s distinction between living a life in “the world” (i.e. the fully conceptual, distanced experience we are familiar with as humans) and in “the environment” (in which one is purely responding to biological imperatives).

“Mere animals,” as Mc Dowell refers to them, do not have the conceptual capacities necessary to experience what it is like to live in “the world.” Furthermore, this does raise a problem for the obvious fact that animals are responsive to their environment as just evidence of response to biological imperatives. Hence we do not need to credit animals with subjectivity, nor do we need to credit them with an experience of their environment that is in any way similar to our own.

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Discussion

• {[green The move from the observations that we do not need to credit animals with conceptual receptivity to the conclusion that we should not credit them with such is one that seems to be glossed over in McDowell’s treatment. Perhaps it could be argued for along the lines of ontological parsimony ( Mc Dowell talks briefly about the absurdity of including such complexity into any account of an animal way of living) but this is not even attempted. In short, it is not clear where the burden of proof lies here. Chris ]}
• {[green More discussion of related matters can be found at Mc Dowell Second Nature ]}

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Seminar Paper

Chris Wilcox